


An entreaty, an interrogation

by luna65



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: M/M, Murder Husbands, PTSD Will, post-S3, sad empath noises
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-17
Updated: 2015-09-17
Packaged: 2018-04-21 06:51:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4819367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luna65/pseuds/luna65
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will can't remember what came after the Fall.  He thinks that's probably for the best.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An entreaty, an interrogation

**Author's Note:**

> Included in the would-be canon of Hannibal and Will in South America.
> 
> I'm slowly working out Will's ever-evolving mental state, which is a fascinating consideration, IMO. There are good days and bad days in the bone arena of his skull.

Some days Will withdrew from the light and notions of genteel existence _chez Lecter_. Some days he felt he might howl and retreat deeper into that darkness at the center of his mind, where he could not recall what had preceded _this life_.

"I'm surprised you haven't drugged me."

Hannibal took a moment to consider the statement, fingers entwined, those surgeon hands poised as if to assert they were innocuous when Will knew differently. Hannibal was very adept at presenting a non-threatening posture most of the time. But it could change within seconds.

"How do you know I haven't?"

"I don't remember anything which would lead me to believe you have."

A smile like the glint of a knife. "Perhaps it is better for you to consider what you **do** know, rather than worry about what you don't."

"Always a sound strategy."

"This situation will resolve itself as it needs to, as it may. There is nothing for you and I to do but allow it to proceed."

"What may be, what will be."

A broader smile. "What Will be, I wonder?"

"Not you." 

As soon as he had uttered the words Will regretted his eternal underlying impulse towards sarcasm. But the calm which Hannibal seemed encased within was not pitted nor cracked.

"I would not expect that, nor welcome it. You must maintain your authentic self, even as you are uncertain what it is."

"If you love me above all else, why didn't you let it happen?"

"I honestly believed it would. But the tide had other plans."

"Chiyoh saved us, you said."

"Yes, but only because she was able to find us."

"It disturbs me that I can't remember anything. I want to reconcile _now_ and _then_. But I can't because -"

"Because sometimes you think you actually died in the fall. I understand this. And sometimes you are happy you lived, you are happy with me. And there is no knowing which landscape you are inhabiting from day-to-day."

"I'm surprised you haven't drugged me so I can recover my memories."

"Logistically, it would take time to find the proper compounds. But if you wish -"

"No. I am dead, and I am alive. Contradictory -"

"- and contrarily."

"And I can reconcile that perspective, eventually. You want me calm."

"I want you _undisturbed_. Your composure does not matter within these walls. You may rage and you may roil, I am beside you in the darkness, as I always have been."

Will breathed, and he counted each breath. "I want to understand a world which offers me only one outcome."

"The one in which no matter what actually happens, you are not alone."

"I am with you."

"And I am with you."

"But you've _always_ been with me, haven't you? Whatever I was doing, you held me there with you."

"And who was in the world?"

"A shadow. A fraud."

"Does it disturb you to consider that those three years were in the pursuit of something you could never attain?"

"Sometimes. But not for my sake."

"You think about the pain you caused."

"The pain **we** caused, because we were each compelled against our natures."

"My nature compels me to claim you."

"In whatever way you can."

Hannibal smiled again, and Will thought of going off the cliff. He dreamed about it every night: sometimes only flashes, sometimes recalling hitting the water and then all was black and blank and when he awoke, gasping for air, the same sense of surreal logic made him consider it was all dreams within dreams. Thinking of Hannibal quoting Poe to him when he spoke of wondering if he would _ever_ wake up.

 

"If you love me -"

"I will do what I believe is best for you."

Another day feeling _disturbed_ , reminding him of his time in a cage. 

_It's all been cages, even when they told me I was free._

Hannibal placed a hand on Will's shoulder. "I believe a very long walk would be therapeutic."

"Among the dead."

"They have nothing to tell us now, we can commune in their collective silence."

 

They walked along the avenues of the necropolis, and Will marveled at the stately elaborate tombs. He had never been particularly fascinated with funereal customs, but it was one of Hannibal's favorite subjects. It made sense that someone who controlled death was also enamored of it.

"Do you want to be buried?" Will asked.

"I have often considered the question. In some scenarios, I wanted to lie beside a loved one. With Mischa in her grave. With you at the bottom of the sea. But I suspect a more banal end awaits us on some fateful day."

Will turned to Hannibal, first glancing around to ensure they were alone.

"That's the only place I thought we _could_ be," he whispered, words dragged out of him one at a time, voice on the edge of hysteria. "That's the only place I could imagine us existing. In the ocean, covered in blood, in each other's arms, drowned in our -"

He paused, the tears finally coming.

"- _obsession_. We cannot exist in a rational world."

Will moved away before Hannibal could touch him. He walked back the way they had come. After a few moments, he turned to see Hannibal standing in the path, utterly still. He stopped, hanging his head, wiping at the tears on his face. then looked up once more.

"Then we shall exist in this world, whatever it is," Hannibal said. "Together."

They stared at each other until Will finally walked back to Hannibal, and they continued their wandering.


End file.
